


cut on your own thorns

by CloudDreamer



Series: a long rotted bouquet [1]
Category: The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: Abusive Parents, Another one?, Blood and Gore, Complicated Relationships, Dr Carmilla's A+ Parenting, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Flowers, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, One Shot Collection, Suicidal Thoughts, Symbolism, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Vampires, why not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-23
Updated: 2020-04-23
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:54:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 777
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23798002
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CloudDreamer/pseuds/CloudDreamer
Summary: Jonny d'Ville is a liar, but he's not enough of a liar to fool himself when it really matters.
Relationships: Dr Carmilla & Jonny d'Ville
Series: a long rotted bouquet [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1714564
Comments: 8
Kudos: 80
Collections: Stowaways' Shenanigans





	cut on your own thorns

Jonny d’Ville is blood and guts all over his skin, hands around throats and rivers run red with gore. He is violence and anger, all anger. Even his love for his crew mates is anger. It’s anger at the world for hurting them, anger at himself for failing them, and his healing touch is more a slap in the face than it is a caress. He is these things because he has decided that he must be. The other option is no option at all. 

It is the truth, to a degree. Or, at the very least, it is the truth as he believes it, underneath the layers of white hot pain, emotions so long since intertwined with his perception of others that makes killing feel like a way to stop it, stop it, stop it just for a moment. The truth is that Jonny d’Ville is afraid. He is not a man. He’s barely eighteen. He doesn’t know how to hold the gun in his hand, let alone aim it. He’ll fire as many bullets as he has just to get a single one anywhere near the target, and the recoil rips his body apart every time. 

There’s a doctor he knows who wears violence like a second skin. It’s so natural for her. She barely seems to care when she rips open a man’s chest to see his heart, plucking it out like a fruit, and she’ll barely look when he screams or laughs or cries. She’s got all the little nuances down, knows all the little ways to drag the pain out and make it look so easy, like it’s a distraction, and so he has to care. He’ll never be like her, he swears, never be like his boss before her, and his father before him. If violence was their tool, he’ll make it his toy. 

He laughs as he dies again, blood gurgling up in his throat and spraying all over the floor, and she sees through him with her cold eye. The others, they see the violence and see a temper. They see a monster, lashing out at everyone he can, except for them, never at them, except for when it is at them, but he doesn’t mean it, because he wants to, and yes, he wants to, he wants to be that monster because monsters aren’t scared, monsters don’t heel at a sharp word. 

His doctor calls him a child, calls him _her_ child, and she makes all his anger so small. She makes it her fault and never changes, not even a little bit at the beginning. When she’s a monster, she’s worse than him, and he’d rather die than feel her hands pinning him against the floor, crushing through his shoulder to the bone bellow, and squirm ineffectually away from the barred teeth at his neck, her words caught up with her laughter and her sobbing. She’ll tear out his guts with that sick smile and call him small when he does the same. Jonny d’Ville will never be cold enough for her, and he’ll never burn half as bright. What even is he, if he’s not enough of a monster? 

She’ll tell him he’s hers, hands in his hair all sweet, and he’ll spit and fight, and then she’ll say something perfect, say something piercing, and then he’s really hers, tears escaping as messily as the blood, and he’ll say he loves her, and he’ll mean it, and she’ll say she knows, and he—

And that’s wrong, that’s not who he is. He’s the storm. He hates her, that’s what he promises, he’ll never say that again. She _did_ something to him, messed up his brain, he says. He wants her gone; he’ll do anything to get her away, but when he wakes up at night, screaming out her name, he doesn’t know if it’s because he’s scared she’ll come back or if he’s terrified she won’t. With her, he’s got a purpose. He’s got someone to hate, someone to protect his family from, but with her gone, he’s just another monster.

Jonny d’Ville wants that, doesn’t he? He built up this barrier of thorns, watered it with blood and fed the soil with flesh, and now he’s ripping his own arms open as he tries to break through, even as she slips through the gaps like a thief and goes right for his core, his heart, all rotten up and shriveled. No matter how many traps he sets, no matter how deep he cuts her on his edges, she’ll give him that same pitying look, and he can’t even scream. All he can do is laugh.


End file.
